/m/cc_sabathia

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According to PI, only 15 pitchers have previously won 200 games by the end of their age 32 season. Unfortunately, that includes guys like Hal Newhouser and George Mullin.

Having looked this up myself (link here, for the curious) that's kind of a weird list. There's a bunch of guys--Catfish, Drysdale, Feller--who were basically finished by the time they won #200. There's also Mullin, who was basically done before he won it.

If you limit the list to the post deadball era--for my purposes here, that's starting 1919--you get ten guys: Feller, Catfish, Roberts, Palmer, Drysdale, Seaver, Marichal, Maddux, CC and Newhouser. Only two of those guys ended up winning 300 games, though Roberts came decently close.

I don't really know what any of that means, except that CC has to be considered a long-shot to win 300 games. But of course, I knew that before I started this rapidly-turning-pointless comment. I will say this, I think you'd be hard pressed to call anyone but CC as the pitcher with the best shot at 300 wins. The only other real candidate is Felix, but I think he's stuck on too bad a team at the moment.

Spanning Multiple Seasons or entire Careers, From 1901 to 2013, For players in the saved report : (Spanning Multiple Seasons or entire Careers, From 1901 to 2013, Through Age 32, (requiring W?200), sorted by greatest Wins: Results), From Age 33 to 99, sorted by greatest Wins

Yeah, that list does not bode well for CC. Especially since the top four had higher established levels of performance to decline from. Sabathia has never lead the league in era or era+ (or srikeouts or WHIP; he's lead in wins twice and innings once) and has a career high ERA+ of 154, which is pretty plae in comparison to those guys. The good news for Sabathia: he could pitch like Tom Glavine did from age 33 on and still win over 330 games.

Probably has something to do with the "only so many pitches" principle. Guys like Drysdale and Feller worked so much so well so young that there was nothing left at age 32. No current pitcher is worked that hard, though of course Sabathia ia one of the workhorses, relatively speaking, of the 21st century.

So yeah, for the most part the guys who pitched a really long time did not come up super young. Walter Johnson is an exception, and Ryan came up young but moved between starting and relief for a few years. By comparison, of the top 10 guys in games played, only Pete Rose was not a full time player by age 21 and he was at age 22.

One thing in Sabathia's favor: he has pitched the fewest innings of anyone on the 200 wins by age 32 list. Two of the three pitchers just ahead of him are Alexander and Maddux, who had the most wins after 32 (of those on the list).

Yeah, that list does not bode well for CC. Especially since the top four had higher established levels of performance to decline from. Sabathia has never led the league in era or era+ (or srikeouts or WHIP

True, but Sabathia has finished second in those categories three times (ERA once, Ks twice), in third place four times (ERA, ERA+ twice, and WHIP), and in fourth or fifth place nine times, in a league that has 14 teams, not eight.

If he stays healthy, Sabathia could end his age-32 season with another 10 wins or so, putting him at ~210 Wins - ahead of the pace of all Expansion Era 300-Game Winners at the end of their age-32 season:

For cumulative team seasons, From 2000 to 2013, Franchise: New York Yankees, For any choice in Opponent,
sorted by greatest Win-Loss % for this split

Aaron Gleeman posted that, counting the playoffs--sorry, Ray--the Twins are now 23-70 when playing the Yankees since Ron Gardenhire took over. That's almost literally unbelievable given that Gardenhire's overall regular season winning percentage is .519.

For people who follow CC closely, does he seems like a smart ballplayer? Is he the kind of guy who can make adjustments as his stuff starts to disappear?

I think he is. He's already shown some decline in stuff, or at least velocity, and he's having a good though not great year. The thing that Sabathia has that will help him is excellent control and that is actually something he is improving with age. In a lot of ways Schilling might be a good comp, big body, one time power pitcher with good control as well that adapted and remained effective as he lost velocity.

Schilling won 117 games after age 32 though he was still a true power pitcher for a few of those seasons but I can see Sabathia remaining effective through his late 30s. David Wells is another easy to see comp. He never had the power that CC had but he threw harder than people remember and had that great control that offsets a lot of other problems.

I agree that CC has the best shot at 300 wins among active pitchers with at least 150 wins (and King Felix is really the only other likely contender among those with 100+ wins). But I don't think CC needs 300 wins to get into the Hall of Fame. He's already at 55 pitching WAR. If he ages well enough to get to 275 wins, he is probably a lock for the Hall: he'll likely have more than 65 WAR, 3,600+ IP (very good for this era, and more than Mussina), 3,000+ strikeouts, and likely at least one more season where he finishes in the top 10 in Cy Young voting. A little more black ink would help, but that looks like a candidate who would draw support from both fans of "Wins" and of WAR.

Two things I think are different about CC and Wells. One is that I think CC is just better than Wells. His five-year ERA+ peak is 142 (2007-11) whereas Wells never even had a single season that good. CC's best four seasons by WAR are all better than Wells' best.

The other issue that while CC is never going to be mistaken for a fitness fanatic, he does seem to have some interest in staying in shape. There were all those stories a coupe of years ago about how he stopped eating Corn Pops (or whatever it was) in the off-season to try and slim down. Wells never really seem to have that interest. (See, for example, this 2000 article when he complains about the Blue Jays trying to get him to lose weight.)

i don't think so. cc is just ok. i know he blew his chance at a no-hitter by mishandling a nubber that was the scratchiest hit of all hits. if cc doesn't lollygag off the mound trusting his fastball to make up for lost time and then drop the ball he gets andy laroche at first easy

i saw that game in person so am adamant on this view. cc was just overpowering the pirates that day though the lineup was pretty scrub worthy.

Interestingly if CC gets just four more wins this year then (CC's wins through age 32 season) + (David Wells' wins from age 33 season on) would be greater than Spahn's career wins. So if he can match Wells from here on out, he's there. And with eight more wins, you could match him with Jaime Moyer to beat Walter Johnson.

is it still a truism that power pitchers last longer? because one would think that would be a point in cc's favor as well

I'm fairly certain that is always going to be the case. A power pitcher can learn to become a better finesse pitcher when he loses a few mph, while a finesse pitcher who loses a few mph will make it easier for teams to square up on him. Only Nolan Ryan can keep his mph when he ages, everyone else loses speed.

I think too many people worry about the physical shape of guys like Sabathia or Fielder, more than they should. Neither position that they play are athletic in nature(in that it requires speed) and they just need to maintain a healthy enough body to play the game.

A power pitcher can learn to become a better finesse pitcher when he loses a few mph, while a finesse pitcher who loses a few mph will make it easier for teams to square up on him. Only Nolan Ryan can keep his mph when he ages, everyone else loses speed.

I feel like right handers last better if they're power pitchers and left handers as finesse pitchers. But I might just have Tommy John and Jaime Moyer in my head and have no numbers to back that up.

I feel like right handers last better if they're power pitchers and left handers as finesse pitchers

I have the same impression. Though there might be a selection bias at work. There's an inexhaustible supply of hard-throwing righthanders, so who wants to take a chance on a crafty veteran righty?

There've been exceptions; Lew Burdette had an entire crafty-old-RHP career. And some of the power RHP who had great control (Robin Roberts, Ferguson Jenkins) hung around for quite a while as control pitchers after losing much of their power. Grover Cleveland Alexander is the archetype of that group.

Also on the comparisons between Wells and Sabathia... does Sabathia have the party reputation that Wells had? I can't help but to think that a partying lifestyle is ultimately detrimental to a players aging.

Heh. It's hard to argue with Wells' regimen, whatever the hell is was. Over the last 18 years of his career, once he became a starter, he missed a half season four times, which ain't bad. In his last 15 seasons he averaged 28 starts a season--maybe that should have been higher, but the starts he missed were clearly injury related. He wasn't skipping four starts a year because he was hungover or suffering from severe fat.

edit: that's actually not so clear--Wells had a bunch of seasons where he was missing two, three, four starts. Didn't he have problems with gout, the rich (fat) man's disease?